The Boy Who Biked the World: Part Two: Riding the Americas

By Alastair Humphreys and Tom Morgan-Jones

In volume two of this marvelous cycling adventure, Tom—a young English boy who decides cycling solo around the world would be a better classroom than the confines of school—heads north from the tip of South America

Having cycled the depth of Europe and the length of Africa, Tom now decides to make his way through the Americas. With a long "uphill" struggle facing him, Tom has the massive Andes and raging Amazon to contend with in South America, deserts and grizzly bears in North America, and a colorful array of characters all along the way. With engaging illustrations, maps, and handwritten journal entries throughout, this book provides an immersive experience for any young adventurer.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Independent Publishers Group
• Release date: Nov 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781908646989

Book preview

Author

Tom’s Route Round the World

Banana Crisis on the High Seas

Tom was sweating. He was nervous. Really nervous. He jiggled up and down, fidgeting from one foot to the other. If you were looking at Tom, you might have thought that he was desperate for the toilet. But this was even more serious than that! Tom was in a hurry, perhaps the biggest hurry he had ever been in. And nobody seemed to care. It appeared – as he bobbed up and down looking at his watch every single second – that everybody was moving in slow motion.

A man strolled about, looking as though he had not a care in the world. A lady was standing still and shaking her shoulders to the beat of the music in her headphones. Standing still! How could anyone have the time to just stand and stare in one place?! Oh dear, oh dear, thought poor Tom. I really am in trouble now. I really am late ...

In front of him was the cause of Tom’s problems. A little old lady. To anyone else, she appeared to be a nice, kind, slightly slow old lady. A little bit like your own Grandma, perhaps. Tom was behind her in the queue and she was taking an age to pay for her shopping.

Come on! screamed Tom inside his head. Hurry up! Please!

He was too polite to actually shout this out loud, though he very much wanted to. He was trying everything he could think of, all his superhero powers of firing laser beams from his eyes or shrinking her to the size of an ant, or making her explode. But nothing he did seemed to work. Because Tom did not have any super powers. He was just a normal boy. The little old lady was in absolutely no hurry. Tom’s journey round the world was about to come crashing to a halt. He couldn’t decide whether to scream or to cry. So instead he just jiggled a bit more, sweated a bit more, and looked at his watch again and again.

He was going to miss the boat.

Don’t miss the boat, young Tom! were the last words Captain Horrocks had said. We can’t wait: we leave at high tide.

Captain Horrocks was about to sail across the Atlantic Ocean on his small yacht, Damsel. He had kindly invited Tom to join his crew on the adventurous crossing from Africa to South America.

Tom had set off from his home to try to ride his bike all the way round the world. He had already pedalled from England to South Africa. Now he needed to get across the ocean so that he could cycle up the Americas. Tom didn’t want to travel by aeroplane – there is no adventure on an aeroplane, only soggy food and annoyingly small TV screens. So Captain Horrocks’ invitation to sail to South America was an exciting opportunity. The chance might not come again.

Captain Horrocks and his crew had been hard at work to get the boat ready. Everything needs to be in good condition before you set out to cross an ocean. They repaired everything that was broken, checked the sails, checked them a second time, tested the water-maker that turns seawater into drinking water, and stocked the boat with piles of food. Everything was ready. Everything, that is, until Captain Horrocks remembered that they had forgotten to buy bananas.

Batter my barnacles! shouted the captain, who enjoyed a colourful selection of seaworthy swear words. We can’t head out to sea without bananas!

Grease my jellyfish! he continued. His face was red with anger behind his bushy white beard. Which fool was in charge of shopping?

"Errr … you were in charge of shopping," replied Sailor Sam but quietly, for he was scared of the captain’s anger.

This took Captain Horrocks by surprise. It was his fault that there were no bananas on board. Suddenly he looked embarrassed rather than cross. The captain waved his arms around a bit more and looked at his crew, hoping to catch someone’s eye and think of a reason to shout at them. But all the sailors were looking at the floor, or looking at their fingernails as though fingernails were suddenly very interesting indeed. They knew, through years of sailing the high seas with Captain Horrocks, that they should never catch his eye when he was cross.

As Captain Horrocks couldn’t find anybody to shout at instead he said quietly and politely,

"Young Tom, would you be so kind as to run along and buy bananas, please? We need a lot."

Tom was delighted! He had been worried about the lack of bananas – they were his favourite adventure food.

"Of course! I love bananas."

Excellent. But make sure you’re quick. We set sail in an hour. We won’t be able to wait for you if you’re late.

And that is how Tom ended up fretting and fidgeting in the checkout queue at the supermarket. He had filled a trolley (one of those really big ones) with nothing but bananas. He piled them as high as he could, a huge teetering, tottering pile of lovely yellow fruit. Tom was standing in the queue waiting to pay whilst the little granny rummaged ever so slowly through her purse looking for her money.

At long, long last the invisible daggers and laser beams that Tom had been firing from his eyes seemed to do the trick. The old lady found the coin she had been searching for, paid for her little basket of shopping and left. Tom emptied his pockets of all the South African money he had, paid in seconds, and sprinted back to the boat. It’s hard to sprint when you’re carrying hundreds of bananas, but that day Tom managed it.

He arrived just as Sailor